PAC chairman Nicolas Gumbo says team has no report on NYS scam

Monday February 29 2016

Rarieda MP Nicholas Gumbo, the chairman of the Public Accounts Committee, at a past event. He said on February 29, 2016 that the committee has not prepared any report implicating at least 50 MPs in the NYS scam. FILE PHOTO | DIANA NGILA | NATION MEDIA GROUP

In Summary

The Auditor-General’s office also said it was still preparing the report.

The National Assembly’s Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has not begun investigating the National Youth Service (NYS) scandal even as speculation mounted around which MP could have been implicated.

PAC chairman Nicolas Gumbo on Monday denied that the committee had a preliminary report implicating over 50 MPs.

He said the committee was yet to begin investigating the scandal as it was still waiting for Auditor-General Edward Ouko to give them a special audit report before commencing theirs.

“There is nothing like the PAC report on NYS. We have asked the Auditor-General to do a special audit but he is yet to submit the special audit and there cannot be a PAC report without the Auditor-General’s report,” said Mr Gumbo, also Rarieda MP.

He spoke as a list of MPs from both sides of the political divide was widely circulated on social media Monday indicating the amount of money they got from the scandal.

Mr Gumbo told the Nation that the claim that the committee had implicated 52 MPs was not true.

He said the committee would not prepare a report before it gets one from the Auditor-General.

The committee requested Mr Ouko to conduct a special audit on the NYS and the Eurobond saga in January following heightened claims that public money had been stolen.

The House team expects the special audit before the end of March.

“The Auditor-General is a constitutional office with a technical mandate. We won’t do our own investigations before we get his report. We want to have the Auditor-General’s report before we start doing our own,” he added.

The Auditor-General’s office also said it was still preparing the report.

Once it gets the auditor’s report, the PAC will prepare its own, which will be tabled in the House for debate.

The scandal led to the resignation of then Devolution Cabinet Secretary Anne Waiguru.

Ms Waiguru filed an affidavit last week implicating National Assembly Majority Leader Aden Duale and Senate Deputy Majority Leader Kipchumba Murkomen. The two have vehemently denied that they benefitted from fraudulent transactions at the NYS.

Other than Mr Duale and Mr Murkomen, speculation has been rife in the corridors of Parliament that many Jubilee and Cord MPs were involved in the NYS scam.